An Afghan/Blanket....Thing

I have been admiring the afghan/blankets that Becky from Strumpet's Crumpets for quite some time now. They are so gorgeous.

Images were sourced from her blog.

I decided I wanted to give it a try too. This is what I have so far.

Fucshia, bright yellow, and a blue-ish color. Hopefully it will go nicely with the comforter covering my futon. It's definitely a work in progress. 

:)

A Yarn-ful Update

First I would like to start out by saying, I have been addicted to Cut Copy today.

This past weekend I finished up a lot of my random, half done projects I had lying around. Kind of wanted to clean stuff up before my hectic March.

Reusable bags.

My favorite pair of mittens I've made so far.

I finally learned how to properly make these kind of fabric flowers. Boy, are they a mess to make. But I love them anyways.

These are a couple of older projects I hadn't photographed yet.

I love the chunky yarn to make hats. Plus, they are super warm.

These brimmed hats are a little funky...The brim kind of goes down over the eyes rather than out. But I found a different pattern in more of the style I was trying to achieve. I'm going to have to try that one next.

My plan is to, in the middle of March, after I get back from shooting a friend's engagement photos, I am going to open an Etsy shop. I know I've been saying I'm going to for awhile now...

I made some wonderful gluten-free cookies yesterday with this mix:

Hodgson Mill

I mixed in peanut butter and choco chips. They are FANTASTIC. Love them a lot. 

"A picture of someone who inspires you."

Okay, so you may be wondering why I posted that piece of typography rather than a portrait of somebody. I have several answers to your wondering. One, because there are SO many people who inspire me it would be an extremely long post because there's no way I could choose just one. The people that inspire me the most are people who want to make a difference and believe that they can make a difference. I get inspired by people who go out an make their dreams come true, who want to make this world a better place.

My second reason is going to sound really backwards from the objective of this particular day, but one person that has inspired me most was the person that told me I wouldn't be doing anything with my life. That I would be back at my high school job after college, which wasn't a glamorous job by any means (are high school jobs ever?) So I take challenges like that and run with them. Now, granted, I may not be doing my absolute dream job right now, but I am working my way there. I guess, I get a kick out of people who tell me I can't. I'm out to prove you wrong. 

:)

Inspire Me: House Tours

One of my favorite things to find on Apartment Therapy is the house tours, especially the ones of lofts. I want a sweet loft apartment really bad. It's like my dream home or something. So this morning before work, I decided to take a peak around and see what I could find.

LA Loft

That view is so gorgeous. I would love to wake up to that every morning. 

Providence, RI Loft

The mismatched chairs remind me of my favorite professor/mentor at college. He loooooves chairs. Plus, those windows, magical.

St. Louis, MO Loft

I want a place with lots of exposed brick. I like the urban, historical feel. 

Another Providence, RI Loft.

Apparently that is the place to be. Rhode Island, here I come!

Chicago, IL Loft

Clever!

Durham, NC Loft

Chandelier greatness.

This isn't from a loft but...

That. Dog. Is. Great.

It is one of those, it's kind of ugly, but that's what makes it absolutely adorable.

I want one.

I leave you with:

Mittens!

I feel like the colors worked better in that hat I posted a couple days ago...

Oh well. Just means, I must make another pair. 

It is 7 pm. This means CHUCK is on. I must go now. 

:)

My New Favorite Hat

I have a few hats to share! I've been working on these the past couple of weeks.

Just trying to get the hat collection up! On my way to having a good inventory stock. 

Look for an Etsy shop soon! 

Top hat is my new favorite! First successful hat with a brim. I may have to keep that one off the market. Which means...I must go buy more yarn.

My Ma came to visit today! Next time I'm home we are going to go fabric hunting and make me some new curtains for my apartment. Yay crafty things! 

I found a cute little boutique today in the town I live in. They've got yarn, fabric, and some craft supplies. They also had a bunch of sweet knick-knacky things and some beautiful jewelry. I may have to go back and get one of the rings I saw.

"A picture of you and the person you have been closest with longest."

I can't just pick one person. So I chose three. All from my college days. I've known them for the past 3-4 years. They are all close for different reasons, which is why I cannot just pick one person. 

Marlon: He was one of my residents and my design buddy. 

Becky: We were on staff together during our Residential Life years. She's moved out of state now and I miss her a lot. 

Josh: He's like my big brother. I miss our talks...and video game nights.

I've been working away on those stupid mittens. Finally interpreted the pattern so I think I can cruise right along now. Tackled a few Granny Squares for my quilt last night. Started a new hat. Need to finish an iPod case. I have yarn and crochet hooks scattered all over the place right now. I attempted a video crochet tutorial. Disaster. I hate listening to my voice...Must come up with another plan. 

I've been working away on some Save the Dates for a couple of really good friends. They are going to be getting married in July and I have the honor of being a bridesmaid! It feels good to be designing again for something real. I like it. 

Speaking of weddings, I will also be doing some engagement photos for a friend from college! I feel like I'm getting roped into the wedding game...I feel as though I should just go all out and open up shop.

:)

Inspire Me: The Giving Keys

Hey! Wow, it was sure a long week without the internet. Kind of refreshing though, not going to lie. I did some designing, some crocheting, some roadtripping, some insane amounts of doing nothing. I am currently trying to rid myself of the worst backache I've had in my life. 

I will start by telling you that tonight I watched probably the best episode of Chuck everrrrr. And now I have to wait until next Monday for what the creators Josh Schwartz and Chris Fedak say is supposed to be the best episode yet... a new one. Had my episode numbers mixed up. Just kidding, it was the epic episode they were talking about. 

I would like to share something with you I found last week that I absolutely adore. Remember the singer/songwriter I posted about awhile back, Caitlin Crosby? Well, I discovered one of her amazing projects called THE GIVING KEYS. 

Basically, they are keys custom engraved with a word of your choice. It is a Pay It Forward project. She met a homeless couple on Hollywood Boulevard and hired them to do the engraving for her as part of paying it forward. The idea is to wear this necklace/bracelet and if you meet, talk, or encounter somebody who you feel is in need of whatever your key represents you are supposed to pass it along to them. All the proceeds from this go to charity.

I think I'm going to get one and have "inspire" engraved. It is my favorite word. I think it is incredibly powerful and that word drives my life.

This as inspired me to consider when I get my shop up and running to donate all or a part of my profits to charity or a non-profit. I have always wanted to do something good and unselfish. I think this could be a good way to start. 

I went to one of my favorite places ever this past Saturday, good ol' Bemidji. I got to hang out with Marlon, a dear friend of mine for the day. (I'm sure you are familiar with him by now, he's mentioned in many of my posts.) It was excellent. I hadn't seen him for months. We did our usual Perkin's adventure loaded with design jargon and life updates. 

We attempted some hats in the afternoon. Didn't get too far. The stitches were difficult to get in between sniffles and sneezes. In my horrible attempted to document this experience, I caught him in mid-sniffle. I gave up after that. 

He mentioned he wanted me to do some sort of tutorial for crocheting. I may have to do that...

We hashed out some of his portfolio stuff and some stuff for the new H.o.S. branding campaign he is starting. We are both super pumped for it and got some good ideas a-flowin'. We also started some planning about our future company and, man, is that going to be frickin' bomb. There are so many great ideas we have. Only have seven more years to go until that gets underway! It's great when you have a business partner who has the same idea brainwaves as you. 

Alright, well enough chatter from me. I'm off to catch up on my blog reading, website browsing, and idea gathering. Maybe some crocheting before bed. I've started mittens and I'm going to finish them this time. 

Tomorrow I will tell you about this fantastic book I bought while on my little adventure...Oh, the suspense...

:)

Whale of a Hat

This weekends little project was this pretty blue hat with a whale! I also started a bag at the end of the week but ran out of yarn...Need to go pick some more up!

This week was really chill. I enjoy my chill weekends. I got in design mode on Friday and yesterday and finalized the logo for my branding project. I posted that earlier today (here). Yesterday was also my Pa's birthday. So today I baked him some goodies to mail to him. I think I will post my recipe tomorrow.

It was a movie/music weekend. A new music fave I found yesterday, a band called Smoosh. They are three sisters from Seattle.

This video is another Seattle band called Head Like a Kite and the song is called "Diamond Paint." It features the lead singer from Smoosh, Asya. 

via YouTube.

I wish there was another day to this weekend. I just want to sit around and do nothing but be crafty for a little bit longer...Tuesday will be my three month, end of my introductory period at work. It has gone by decently fast and at the same time it feels like forever...

This week's To Do List: 

-Stationery for Flower Girl Clothing Boutique

-Finish Bag

-Yoooooga (since I slacked last week...)

Hope you had a good weekend! 

:)

Diamonds & Yarn

Today I was listening to a podcast at work about diamonds from the Discovery Channel (love that channel.) And more specifically the Hope Diamond. It was thought to have been cut out of a larger diamond The French Blue, which originally cut from the The Tavernier Blue diamond. The French Blue was stolen during the French Revolution along with many other pieces of jewelry. The French Blue was the only diamond not to be recovered. 

Then the Hope Diamond appeared in the family of Henry Philip Hope in 1839. After his death it ended up in the hands of his son, Henry Thomas Hope. And after a long journey through a few owners it was purchased by Henry Winston in 1949. He donated it to the Smithsonian Museum. 

Image found here.

During the podcast they did some recreations of all three diamonds and placed them inside of each other finding out that the Hope Diamond was actually cut from the French Blue. They also thought that there was a sister diamond cut too since there would have been a large enough piece left over. They said though, that there wasn't and that the extras were just ground to dust. Which is sad because of how precious that would be. 

They ended the podcast discussing handmade diamonds. I think handmade diamonds ruin the whole allure of real diamonds. Especially with how long it takes to create an actual diamond, billions of years. A factory now days can produce a diamond in FOUR days! Ridiculous! I love technology but I also love the things that Mother Nature  produces and I think some things should be left untouched by science. But those are just my thoughts. 

I think I'm going to start listening to podcasts like that at work more. It was very interesting. I love learning! 

On another note: 

Its the weeeekend! It's here! Finally. What a long week. I did accomplish 3 crochet projects this week thought.

Up first is a brown hat with a floral printed flower. Button center, of course :)

Bluuuue iPod case. 

And finally a new bright blue neckwarmer/cowl. 

Hopefully these can all go onto my Etsy shop when I finally open one up. I'm hoping by the end of the month I can get that up and running. We shall see! I have a cute idea for something new. Something along the lines of the Two Peas in a Pod. That will be my Sunday and into next week project. I've also started my granny squares for a quilt. That will be an on going project...What a project to start...

Hope you have a fantastic weekend! Stay warm. 

:)

Thursday's Treasures

Hey all, today was a better day than yesterday :) Thank goodness. During my morning internet perusing before I left for work, I found a couple of sweet things I would like to share with you.

This awesome print from this Etsy Shop. Very creative and perfect for Valentine's Day. 

 

 

This completely EPIC calendar. Gotta love Pantone! 

Found here. 

A great crochet tutorial from Strumpet's Crumpets. It's how to make Granny Squares. I've been wanting to make a quilt out of them (which will take forrrrrreeeeeeeverrrrrrr). 

Some simply amaaaaazing illustrations found here. Check them out. Sick. 

Who ever thought of using an old drawer for a bookshelf? Not me, but I wish I would have thought of this first! Such a good, unique, and repurposed way to create a shelf/nightstand. Got to love Apartment Therapy. One day I'll throw together a post of some of my favorite things from there. 

That's what I've got for today. Tomorrow I think I will post 3 projects I've been working on all week and am currently working on finishing up as we speak. Maybe I will even try out one of those granny squares tonight. 

Also, keep an eye on A Day in Marlon's Life and Jason Lien's Blog. They are two of my friends from college who are on their way to graduating this semester! These blogs are for their design work. They're two talented guys.

:)

Crocheting on Christmas

Happy Monday! Hope it wasn't too horrible.

I have three crochet projects I would like to share with you. Two were done during Christmas and one a bit more recently.

Green iPod case. 

Orange neckwarmer/cowl with 2 cream flowers. 

And the more recent, green hat with owl. This is one of my favorite hats I've created so far. 

I really want to get a mini sewing machine. Mini, mostly because I don't have a whole bunch of space and I just want something that I can do simple crafts with. I have some ideas that I really want to put into action, but doing hand stitches would just take forever. There are just so many things on the "I Want" list...

Okay, well that's all I have for you right now. Short and sweet. 

:) 

New Looks & Two Peas in a Pod

Hope everybody had a good New Year's Eve :) I was lazy, snowed in, and did nothing except watch some TV shows and crafty things. It was pretty nice.

For the new year, as you can see, the blog has a new look. I was in graphic design mode yesterday and today. Yesterday it was the blog and today I was working on something else (which I will post tomorrow, I think.) It was nice because I haven't been feeling it for quite some time. It felt good to work on my layout, typography, and color skills again. I like to think typography and color palettes are somewhat of a forte for me.

The other new look is my apartment. I got my new bookshelf for Christmas which meant I got get rid of my big bulky TV stand that works better in a large space.
I read somewhere in the past that using your bedroom/bed for things other than sleeping and napping makes it hard to sleep at night. Since my apartment is so small its pretty much one big bedroom, I needed to give myself a space only for sleeping. Its been helping, I've been able to sleep better at night now that I'm not using my bed for a craft station. Plus, I have a mini office, to help with the creativity. I really like my box now. I wish it would have been like this from the beginning...

I also was on a crochet kick yesterday. I've had an idea for the past few days and hadn't really had the time to put it in action until yesterday. Thank goodness for long weekends. (Man, is it going to be difficult to go back to 5 day work weeks when the past two have been short and sweet.) I'm so excited about this one, I just had to post it tonight! 

Aren't they just the cutest! 

The pod gave me a bit of trouble trying to figure out the size and I didn't have any green embroidery thread. But for a prototype, I think it was a success. 

I smile every time I look at them. 

Well that is all for now. I still have a bunch of goodies to post in the upcoming week that I didn't get to last week. Please keep a lookout for them! 

:)